http://www.citizen.co.za/index/article.aspx?pDesc=12687,1,22
Citizen
24/1/06

'Culture of compliance’ needed to stop shack building
PARLIAMENT – A “culture of compliance” was needed to stop homeless people erecting shacks, Parliament’s finance select committee heard on Monday.
“What is happening now is that anybody just builds anything, anywhere,” Western Cape housing MEC Richard Dyantyi said. “We need to (instill) a culture of compliance.”
Dyantyi told the committee that urbanisation and the eviction of labourers by struggling farmers was contributing to the province’s shack dwelling problem and adding to the low-cost housing backlog.

Cape Argus

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=124&art_id=vn20060130112900339C513750

Cape residents ready to take to the streets

January 30 2006 at 01:07PM

By Bulelani Phillip

Some Cape Town residents have warned of more street protests in the run-up to the local government elections if the city's leadership does not deliver on its promises to accelerate service delivery.

In fact, residents of QQ section in Khayelitsha have planned a march to the mayor's office on Wednesday in order to give her "formal warning" of planned protests if the city does not immediately provide ! them with better access to water, electricity, sanitation and refuse collection.

This article was originally published on page 4 of Cape Times on January 30, 2006

Cape Times

30 Jan 2006

Hall dwellers say Cape council 'insensitive' Babalo Ndenze
January 30 2006 at 10:10AM

Few home comforts: Lucinda Lorie does her school work on her family's bed in the crowded and run-down Belhar community hall that has become her temporary home. Photo: Lulama Zenzile, Cape Times
!
As living conditions worsen in the community hall that has housed 118 Belhar backyard dwellers for the past seven months, they accuse the city council of being "insensitive" for failing to meet them for months.

February 9, 2006 11:28 AM

Abahlali baseMjondolo applied for legal permission to march on the Premier of KwaZulu-Natal on the 20th of February. They have just been informed, by telephone, that the march will not be allowed to go ahead. They have requested Sutcliffe to put this in writing so that it can be formally contested. There has already been something of a small but militant protest at Sutcliffe's verbal banning and some people are optimistic that the police's shock at this display of force will produce a shift.

March organisers estimate that around 20 000 people will participate in this march. Two taxi associations are supporting the march but that still means that the bulk of the people will have to walk into town. People have made it clear that they are willing to do that. The initial response is that, as when Sutcliffe illegally and unconstituionally banned the Foreman Road march scheduled for 14 September 2005, people will again march in defiance of Sutcliffe's ban. But meetings will need to be held in each settlement before a collective decision is arrived at.

http://www.southafrica.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/9636.php

Threats made to shack dwellers at Joe Slovo settlement in Mobeni Heights in Lamontville
by Steph Lane and Fazel Khan

Two weeks ago at the Joe Slovo informal settlement, bulldozers came in and destroyed the house of an outspoken member of the community. He had invited a journalist to the settlement to talk about corruption in the housing allocation process at Joe Slovo, accusing the local community leader of giving preferential treatment to family members, and of excluding Xhosa residents from new housing. Other members of the community, including Mrs. B. Gule, are worried that their houses are next to be razed.

Press Statement: SABC and police shut Abahlali baseMjondolo
out from ”Asikhulume”

Durban 2006-02-12:

We, representatives of the Democratic Socialist Movement
(DSM) hereby direct our strongly felt protest against the
manner in which the SABC’s live broadcast of “Asikhulume”
was organised today. Abahlali baseMjondolo Movement South
Africa, the organisation uniting shack dwellers across
Durban, had been invited to be part of the panel discussing
this show’s topic: the housing crisis. We DSM members
arrived at the broadcast venue, the Cato Crest Community
Hall, at 17h50, to closed doors guarded by the SAPS. We

Available from

http://www.theherald.co.za/herald/news/n01_20022006.htm

The Herald 20 Feb 2006

Minister demands probe of Uitenhage house seizures

By Francois Rank Chief Reporter

HOUSING Minister Lindiwe Sisulu has commissioned a special investigation
into the possibly illegal and unconstitutional seizure and sale of
State-subsidised houses in Uitenhage revealed by The Herald last week.

Sisulu launched the probe in reaction to a report in The Herald on Friday
that residents in the destitute area of Tiryville have been fighting an
ongoing battle with Uitenhage law firm Lessing Heyns and Co after their

Dear Dr Sutcliffe

RE: YOUR ONGOING DENIAL OF OUR CONSTITIONALLY GARUANTEED RIGHT TO PUBLIC PROTEST

I write on behalf of Abahlali baseMjondolo to register our organisation's protest, in the strongest terms, against the way you and other Metro authorities are dealing with our exercise of our Constitutional rights.

While you may not agree with content or urgency of the demands we press, and we would not expect you to ensconced as you are in a huge beachfront apartment, you must realise that they are legitimately posed demands seeking nothing more than what is guaranteed in the Constitution; access to housing. As we have very little money, no institutional power and limited access to the mass media, we have only our collective protest action to rely upon with which to persuade you to divert greater resources to the scandal of the housing situation in eThekwini. Where directors of Moreland, for instance, can pick up a phone to you to address their interests or the rich of Clare Estate can get your attention at a cocktail party, we are not that fortunate. Our recent experiences have convinced us that we can only attempt to influence policy formation and delivery by protesting.

Homeless people shot in eviction protest
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=139&art_id=vn20061031124023829C772955
Norman Joseph
October 31 2006 at 02:55PM

Two homeless people were shot and wounded at a Ravensmead school when police allegedly opened fire with rubber bullets as an eviction turned violent.

At about 7.30am on Tuesday, Johannes Bastian, 40, and Cynthia Donberg, 36, were shot at the Florida Primary School.

Police had been called in to evict about 300 people who moved into the disused building a year ago after they were evicted from backyard dwellings.

In three windows and three parts, you can watch Giles and Khan's acclaimed 21 minute (2006) documentary about the shackdwellers' struggle. A great introduction to the movement.

Breyani and the Councillor Part 1